Our latest discussion with Mike highlights Isosceles people.
Mike reflects on the importance of ensuring everyone in the company feels comfortable expressing themselves and explains why our people are at the core of Isosceles.
All-hands call
Several times each week, the entire Isosceles team join the all-hands call and a member of the team presents an interesting topic focused on work or home-related activities.
“It is a wonderful opportunity,” Mike explains, “for individual personalities to shine through in an otherwise busy meeting.”
Following a brief presentation by a chosen member of staff, we return to the standard agenda and ask:
- “What can we celebrate from yesterday?”
- “Does anyone have any interesting client meetings today?”
- “Are there any roadblocks that need to be removed?”
Recent weeks have generated some very interesting conversations.
Isosceles Head of Technology James Walsh talked about the volunteering he has been doing at a vaccination centre. James also took the opportunity to run through some interesting facts on the environment and each person’s carbon footprint.
Similarly, Graduate Trainee Accountant James Burrows recently took us on a very “thought-provoking journey”. James explained how he joined his Scout group and volunteered to complete some “life-changing” work at a school in Uganda.
To continue with this theme, Financial Controller Ronan Wade described how he has been heavily involved in a charitable project in Zambia during the past few years.
“Ronan has had a long commitment and association with ongoing projects in Zambia,” Mike explains, “and he uses his accounting and finance skills for the benefit of schools and hospitals in poorer parts of the world.”
Elsewhere in the business, we have some members of the team who are and have been school governors, volunteers at homeless shelters and others who actively participate in a range of exciting projects and sporting pursuits.
“I was pleased to see the sense of community, public-spiritedness and significant positive contributions to the community that exists in the company,” Mike explains, “and it is really good to hear how accounting, finance and HR professionals are using their skills to assist in worthwhile projects outside of work.”
“Being an accountant is not simply a label for you as a person, rather it is a set of skills and a badge of honour,” Mike explains, “and those skills can make a meaningful contribution both in terms of the companies we work with and how people spend their time outside of work.”
“When we are interviewing, we are always interested in the type of activities people have done as we know that these experiences are character building and help the individual have a better perspective and more balanced view of life.”
Isosceles news: New clients and new graduates
Recent weeks have seen the onboarding of a new client and the conclusion of our most recent graduate recruitment campaign.
“In the most recent recruitment cycle, we have recruited a record number of graduates in this intake,” Mike explains, “and we are going to run more graduate recruitment campaigns throughout the year both in response to the growth we have seen and visibility we have of the second half of 2021.”
“We are excited by our ability to attract high-quality candidates to the business and the skills these new team members will bring to Isosceles. It bodes very well for the future of Isosceles.”
We regularly make sure we get feedback during the graduate recruitment process. The feedback that has come from the graduates contacted during the recruitment process has been overwhelmingly positive. We often find that candidates enjoy meeting people at Isosceles, particularly the other graduates because it gives them a sense of our culture.
Referring to the need to optimise the composition of our squads, Mike explains how this fact was a primary motivation for embarking on an additional recruitment cycle.
“The increase in the volume of activity in existing clients has placed greater demands on the squads.”
“In addition, the level of new enquiries has increased significantly, we are observing a need for more graduate accountants to support senior members of the team.”
Opportunities abound for iFD
“iFD is generating new opportunities with several companies,” Mike explains.
“We started work with Coherence Digital, an exciting fast-growing digital marketing agency which specialises in Drupal.”
“The founders have been very mature in the way they have thought about the foundation stones they need to ensure they have the scalable systems, processes and controls required to achieve growth.”
Related | iFD host another successful FD networking event
Preparations are currently underway for iFD’s next introductory iFD Community event.
Other news: WeThrive, Isosceles’ future in Sheffield and the power of big data
In terms of other activities, we have been continuing to collect feedback from our most recent WeThrive survey to download the lessons and suggestions.
“We are currently conducting a thorough reorganisation,” Mike explains, “and we haven’t articulated the changes in line management enough yet and that is a priority moving into the second half of the year.”
“WeThrive continues to add significant value and we are still looking to introduce this to our clients.”
